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It was a full house at Wayne Manor. After a brutal patrol and a plethora of injuries to be tended to, Alfred had mandated at least twelve hours of bedrest for each bat. Although there had been grumbles of displeasure with the order from the group, none of them would disobey Alfred after he had spent the early hours of the morning placing stitches, dressing wounds, and setting Jason's nose.
After hot showers and donning fresh pajamas, the bats became the Waynes again and retreated up to the manor's kitchen for a quick, hearty meal before bed. While the family participated in their normal post-patrol dinner conversation, Jason couldn't help but notice Damian quietly staring at him. He was able to justify it, the kid had rarely seen him with a facial injury thanks to his helmet's durability. It had taken a significant blow to force the helmet onto his nose hard enough to break it.
The family parted ways and retired to their respective bedrooms, eager to climb into freshly made beds. Suddenly, twelve hours of bedrest didn't seem like such a daunting, unappealing task as when it was first presented. Damian, however, found it to feel more and more like torture with each minute that passed.
Jason's face, his nose taped and bruises developing quickly under his eyes, took Damian back to place he had never cared to revisit. As he attempted to will himself to sleep, memories overtook him. He had remembered the last time he had seen Jason's face covered in bruises, the last time he had seen Jason with the league, his punishment for attempting to escape Nanda Parbat with Damian in tow. Although Damian had been complicit in Jason's plan, his mother had been able to protect him from the wrath of Ra's al Ghul.
He had been forced to stand at Ra's' side and watch as members of the league viciously beat his protector for "kidnapping" him. As Jason laid bloodied in front of his feet, Ra's doled out Jason's death blow, banishing him from the league, and if he were ever to return, Damian would be the one to kill him. He watched as his brother was dragged away, longing to go to him, but knew Ra's would never allow him to leave with someone who so greatly disrespected the League of Assassins.
He wondered for years if akhi was alive or dead. Each time Damian was tasked with a kill, he feared he would find Jason to be his target. Upon arrival to Gotham and the revelation of the Red Hood's identity, Damian was elated to find that Jason was alive and well, yet was conflicted by the interactions they had had as Red Hood and Robin. He was standoffish, treating him like some snot-nosed kid. Did he not recognize him? Did he not remember him?
Damian tried to be mature about it. He was thankful Jason did not seem to remember the years of pain he endured, suffering to protect Damian from what discipline he had earned.
But as much as Damian tried, he was still a child. A child who longed to reunite with his big brother, a child who longed to be loved by the only person who truly knew him.
Damian allowed hot tears to roll onto his pillow, dirtying the pristine sheets Alfred had so meticulously prepared for him. He didn't care anymore. He was so tired of feeling lonely when the person he so desperately wanted to be around was a couple doors down. He sniffled into the silence, the closest he could get to cathartic crying.
He heard the gentle rap of knuckles against his door.
"Damian?'
Damian held his breath. Jason. The person he both needed and dreaded the most. He sat up, scrubbing the tears away from his eyes with the ends of his sleeves and clearing his throat, "Yes, Todd?"
"I heard you up, mind if I come in?"
"You may enter," he replied without thinking.
Jason came through the door quietly, shutting it behind him, as to not attract more guests to the room. Jason had always been good about that in the league, making sure Damian had space to express his emotions freely without fear of intrusion. Damian didn't know if that was just something in Jason's nature or something he did just for him. Either way, he appreciated it.
Jason came and sat on the edge of Damian's bed, one foot curled up underneath him, the other firmly planted on the floor, his way of allowing Damian to open up or kick him out at any time. They sat in silence for a minute, aside from Damian's sniffles.
Damian was the first to break.
"Todd?"
"Yeah, kid?"
"Does your face hurt?"
Jason snorted at the question, making him wince with pain, "I mean, yeah, but it's nothing I haven't handled before."
Damian looked down at his hands in his lap.
"Dames, don't tell me my nose is what got you all worked up," Jason teased.
"No, it's just that-" the words caught in Damians throat, "-it's just that I remembered you breaking your nose. From before."
The words hung in between the two. Damian kept his eyes focused on his lap. He didn't know if he wanted to see Jason's expression.
A hand, more gentle than he thought possible, carded through his hair, "Oh Damian, I had no clue that's what you were thinking about, I didn't even think you remembered. You were just a little kid."
Damian's eyes quickly met Jason's, frustration and tears overcoming him, "Of course I remembered it! You raised me up until that day. My last memory of you was with a mangled nose and a bruised face! And then when you revealed yourself as Red Hood and I finally see my brother again after all these years you act like none of it ever happened, like I'm just some child father forces you to be around!"
Damians hands gripped onto the comforter over him and his eyes squeezed shut, tears dripping from his eyelashes.
Jason withdrew his hand from his hair and held Damian's clenched fists in his hands, "Damian, I'm so sorry. I thought you already knew who I was when we first saw each other on patrol. Not to shift blame here, but Dick should've told you," Jason joked, albeit ineffectively, "I just figured you were too young to remember me, and I didn't want to bring up horror stories from the league just so you'd remember your catatonic bodyguard."
"You weren't just my bodyguard, akhi," Damian sniffed.
"I know, Dames, but that's what I told myself to keep from bringing everything up to get you to remember. I didn't want to hurt you, but I'm so sorry that I did anyways. I was so scared I would reveal that we were brothers through Talia that I neglected the fact that, as much as I hate to admit it sometimes, we're brothers through Bruce."
"Yeah?"
Jason slid his way up the bed and sat against the headboard next to Damian, "You bet, kid. The rest of the losers in this house right now are only related to us through Bruce, we're essentially full blooded siblings."
Damian attempted to hide his smile at this statement with a roll of his eyes, "Sure, Todd."
"Actually, that's Todd-Wayne-al Ghul to you, baby brother."
The grin Damian tried to hide required both an eye roll and a scoff to cover his tracks, but it didn't stop Jason from pulling him into his side and keeping him there.
Damian allowed himself to rest against his brother for a moment, "Are you staying here tonight, akhi?" he questioned, hesitance in his voice.
"Well I just spent the first hour of our bedrest sentence staring at the ceiling and I don't know if I can handle another eleven of that same ceiling. You mind if I try yours out for a few?"
"If it will help you to stare at my ceiling, you may," he didn't try to mask his smile as he stared up at Jason.
"Thanks Dami, glad you said yes, cause I also forgot my teddy bear in my safehouse, and you're just about the same size," Jason teased, worming his legs under the sheets and wrapping both arms tightly around Damian.
Damian smacked his shoulder with force before burying his face into the other. But Jason didn't mind. That's just what brothers did.